


It Takes A Village

by unlockthelore



Series: Affections Touching Across Time [3]
Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Attempt at Humor, Banter, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gen, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, On Hiatus, Post-Canon, Survivor Guilt, Ten Years Later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:07:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23784415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unlockthelore/pseuds/unlockthelore
Summary: Rin has never been one who sought power physically. Her strength lied in matters of the heart. However, heart wouldn’t always keep the ones she loved safe. And she still has much to learn.Recent Update2. To Fool One's Eyes -As Rin prepares to depart on a journey, she seeks counsel and comfort in the sky.
Relationships: Rin & Kaede (InuYasha), Rin & Sesshoumaru's Mother (InuYasha), Rin/Sesshoumaru (InuYasha)
Series: Affections Touching Across Time [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1713493
Comments: 19
Kudos: 42





	1. Reason

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the dawn of a new day, Rin finds it impossible to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place ten years after the events of InuYasha: Final Act, Rin is currently **twenty-one years old**.

**Reason**

The night seemed to stretch on for eternity. Crickets chirping in the tall grass, a vast endless sky glittering with stars, a moon rounded and bright shining down upon her. For the umpteenth night in a row, she wished the crescent moon would come in place of the full moon — and never once did she wish for the new moon, lest it gives certain individuals trouble. Though at least, if she closed her eyes long enough and drank in the night’s ambiance beneath its glow, she could almost pretend the shadow she adored was there with her.

Alas, it was a pipe dream and once Rin opened her eyes, her solitary shadow stretched long before her. Tears might have stung her eyes if she were a few years younger, loneliness crushing the fluttering heart within her chest, but she’d grown. Grown past the helplessness and fear of being left behind. 

Yet, if asked what she feared now, she was hesitant to even burden herself with the thought. 

So consumed in thought, Rin barely heard the rickety creaking and crackling footsteps behind her as someone neared. A warm gnarled hand resting heavily on her shoulder turns her toward the weary aging face of Kaede. With the years wearing upon her, grayed hair lightened to an almost bone-white and tanned skin creased by time told the length of time she’d been alive — betraying death again and again. Concern and care show within her remaining eye and the gentle kneading of her fingers against Rin’s shoulders, shifting the silk of her yukata and tenderly brushing through the length of her hair. 

“Why are ye still awake, child?” Kaede asks softly, though her voice lacks any indignation or reprimand. Her hands caressing Rin’s shoulders in a manner that almost begets a hug but Kaede makes no move to pull her closer nor does Rin pull away. 

Touch had been a sensitive thing for some years. Despite her respect for her elders, her willingness to trust adults was gradually built upon. Kaede had earned her trust and more. Breathing in deeply, the chill night air pricks her lungs with icy tendrils grasping at her heart, carefully easing their hold as she exhales. Kaede waits patiently as Rin breathes until her hands no longer tremble and the buzzing of the fireflies isn’t all she can focus upon. 

Rin sighs feelingly, smoothing clammy palms against the sides of her yukata. “I’m sorry, Lady Kaede, I… couldn’t sleep.”

The hesitation hardens Kaede’s expression but not with anger or disappointment but understanding. 

“Come along, child.” With a light pat to Rin’s shoulder and a hand resting at the crook of her elbow, Kaede led her inside. “It’s cold and ye will need strength for tomorrow.”

Tomorrow. Rin’s eyes flutter shut for a moment and she hopes that it’s interpreted as soaking in the warmth of the fire burning in the hearth, or relief at being found at her lowest. Despite the burning ache in her chest at being seen. No stranger to comfort, she tried not to rely too heavily on the kindness of others. Her own feet may tremble but they were strong. If she couldn’t rely on herself, then how could she help to do anything further?

The steadying weight of Kaede’s hand rests on her shoulder, warm and grounding. In spite of her age, Kaede’s strength hasn’t lessened just yet and she guides Rin effortlessly to one of the cushions set near the hearth. And with her tiredness and the storm raging in her mind, Rin found herself helpless to follow the cajoling. 

Kneeling on the cushion with her hands resting in her lap, her muscles that’d been protesting from the cold now aching as her body tried to soak in the warmth. Across the room, Kaede flits. Clinking of jars and shifting pots scarcely draw more than a raised brow from Rin until the older woman’s gentle smoky voice resounds from the other side of the flames. Gazing into coppery-orange embers, Rin blinks away the dots forming at the edge of her vision as a sweet smell fills the room. Her mouth running dry and tongue pressing to the inside of her cheek as she lifts her gaze to Kaede. 

“When I was a young girl, my sister would often catch me wandering the fields when I couldn’t sleep,” Kaede said, setting two mugs aside as she ended to the pot hooked over the flame. The sweet scent wafting from its opening. “Strict as she might have been, she was very kind to me.”

Rin felt the need to say something at those words. Knowing how difficult it was for Kaede to speak of her sister. Opening her mouth and closing it, the only thing she could bring herself to do was gape. Memories of impending death with an arrow narrowly missing the tips of her hair and embedding in the chest of her would-be murderer, the cool and empty stare of the woman who plunged the arrow in his chest. Her strides, confident and sure, but with a grace that was unearthly. 

Such moments weren’t easily forgotten and when Rin could summon the words, she muttered softly. “Lady Kikyo was kind to me as well.”

Despite her lack of cheer or acknowledgment, thanks was all that Rin could bestow upon her as some deep-seated twisting in her stomach was swallowed down to follow after the shadow she’d always known. The corner of Kaede’s lips twitched as if she wanted to smile but suppressed it knowingly, removing the pot and setting it aside to cool. Rin’s eyes followed it thoughtfully, and hearing the elder priestess’ laughter, her cheeks warmed and she averted her gaze. 

“Yes,” Kaede said, sighing. “I suppose in the depths of her soul, my sister’s kindness was such a force that not even death and betrayal could overwhelm.”

Rin’s fingers curled into fists, catching on the fabric of her yukata and pulling it taut. It struck her for a moment when Kikyo saved her. How calm and cool she'd been. Her careful composure, the gentle glide of her footsteps. While she was happy to see her and thank the one who saved her, Rin tried to turn her eyes from the truth. In her heart, she knew that Kikyo could not be alive. There was something about her that simply wasn’t right. And Rin prayed even now that her soul was in peace in the afterlife. 

From over the fire, they shared a look. Kaede’s eye searching over Rin’s person while Rin’s own lingered on Kaede’s remaining eye to find the depth of what she felt. 

Eventually, the stillness was broken by Kaede dipping one of the mugs into the pot, lifting it and sloshing the liquid around. “And I believe if she still had need of it, her love for sweets would have remained as well.”

“Lady Kikyo loved sweets?”

“ _Terribly_ so.” Kaede’s chuckle was equally bitter and mirthful, her gaze lingering on the mug’s rim as she cleaned the frothing golden liquid from it. “Why, I believe she indulged more than I did, although I was happy to give her what I could of my own.”

Rin sighed, accepting the mug when it was offered to her. Inhaling the sweet scent easing the knots in her stomach and reminding her of the weariness in her bones. “It smells sweet.”

“Warm honey milk,” Kaede stated proudly. “Does the trick for the restless soul.”

Restless. Glancing down at her faint reflection in the golden concoction, Rin wondered if that was the right word for her. Was it restlessness that drew her to stand outside in the chill of night and wish for the moon’s phase to change? To see a glimmer of the shadow dipping beneath the clouds and into the trees only to emerge with a single goal — to see her. Whether that shadow carried gifts neatly folded for her to marvel over, or simply came bare-handed with nothing but a quiet word and a fleeting smile, Rin cared not.

The sweet scent interrupted her thoughts, nestling deep within her mind and Rin tried to remain in the present. “Thank you.”

With a dismissive wave the hand and a shake of the head, Kaede said. “No need for that child, speak, tell me what bothers ye.”

Cold hardened Rin’s tongue but warm saccharine melted it, loosening it considerably before she could think to restrain it. 

“Dreams…” Rin said, voice trailing off as she hesitated to press further.

Glancing her over carefully, Kaede hums. “Nightmares?” She corrects gently, gracious enough to ignore when Rin almost flinches as if given a blow to the head. “… Of the other side?”

It is a long stretch of silence between them. Sipping of warm honey milk bitters on Rin’s tongue, every blink reminding her of what awaited on the _other side_. Time mattered not to the dead. Attempting to understand how long it is she spent there was a fool’s game. Regardless, her childhood self counted the seconds with songs of grandeur with a single name upon her lips to give comfort. Rin worried the rim of her mug between her lips, slick with milk, so thick she hoped the words would be caught upon them and carried off. 

Kaede shuffled on the other side of the flames, coaxing them to burn brighter she tossed bits of wood into the hearth. Her hand rested heavily upon her knee with the faintest twitch in her knuckles. A sure sign of wanting to reach out but withholding. 

“I heard of what happened to ye,” Kaede intoned, her voice gentle and without pity. Twisting apprehension riddled Rin’s gut slowly loosening. Pity, she could do without, and Kaede seemed to understand. “Ye have wandered upon death’s doorstep more oft than a child should. Any soul would quake beneath knowing what lies on the other side.”

“I don’t fear what is on the other side, Lady Kaede.” Rin interjected, setting the mug against her thigh, heat too cool to scald pressing against clinging silk. Her opposite hand resting upon its side, brushing against the splintering wood and brittle metal idly. “I wanted to do this for myself. None other…”

Kaede didn’t respond. She lifted her head higher and despite Rin’s growing stature, in moments such as this, Kaede towered over her in matters of presence and wisdom than height. Her eye gleamed in the low light. No sooner would her gaze cloud than her sight lose its keeness. Rin stared back impassively, her grip on her mug loosening as she lifted it to her lips, taking another sip. The lines around Kaede’s mouth deepened as her lips upturned, a throaty chuckle both somber and mild breaking the silence.

“Sesshomaru wanted ye to learn how it is to live among humans but… Rin, have ye reconciled with the fact that ye are _alive_?” 

Rin felt her throat constrict. Her heart stammered in beating and the restless energy thrumming beneath her skin rushed with nowhere to go. Blood pounded in her ears and she pressed her lips together, lest her heart try to escape her chest. Wind howled against the rooftop, wooden beams groaning and coppery flames crackling. Shadows cast upon Kaede’s features only made her good eye gleam in the low light as she tipped her chin back, raising her own mug to sip. 

She didn’t want to tell her. Of the faces which plagued her mind in the depths of night, ones she should recall and _did_ but dreaded to linger upon. Long hours beneath silvery moonlight asking naught but the shadow in her mind what it is that death had taken from her or _given_ unwarrantedly. Whether it be memories she’d tucked deep in her chest, resurfacing as a parting gift, or warnings.

There were so many faces. So many deaths.And yet, time and time again, he wished to spare _her_ life. Desire gnawed at her and Rin swallowed it down with another mouthful of honey.

“… He is the reason I am alive,” Rin managed to say, the words grating at her throat and burning her tongue, honey doing little to help soothe or help their slide. 

Kaede shook her head. “Nay, child.” Her brows creased, wrinkles in her forehead deepening. “Sesshomaru would not have returned you to life, nor would Tenseiga have responded if not for your effect on his heart.” Then with a slight mutter that was _almost_ too nonchalant for Rin to catch, she said. “Though I doubted it beat in his chest. Ye have proven me wrong.”

If she had been a few years younger, Rin might have defended Sesshomaru’s heart to the last. But she was a child no longer. Even she could see the daiyoukai’s heartlessness or at least the facade of it that he wore. Mustering a tired chuckle, Rin shook her head. “Lady Kaede…”

Kaede chuckled mirthfully, and Rin couldn’t help but join her. Finding it easier to breathe once a few choked laughs slipped past her lips and prickling wetness rolled from the corners of her eye. If Kaede notices, she says nothing. Allowing Rin to gather herself once their laughter died, and the hearth’s flame began to diminish, shadows stretching long.

“You are why you are alive, Rin,” Kaede insisted, and Rin hummed softly. Neither confirming or denying. “Sesshomaru had the means to return you to the world of the living, but it was with your heart that he was swayed to do so.”

Rin hummed once again. Thinking back on it, she couldn’t tell what it is that she’d done to sway him so. True, she was grateful for it. Their paths had intersected and she was happy for every day that she could walk alongside him. Her apprehension grew as they washed the mugs, cleaned the cinders from the hearth and prepared for bed. Kaede’s hand resting over Rin’s own before they parted to their respective bedding, calloused palms brushing against softened skin, as if searching for wounds invisible to the eye. 

“Hear, child. Ye have suffered enough, and endured worse…” In the dim, it was easier to avoid the knowing of Kaede’s eye when Rin closed her own but the words washed over her, just as the elderly priestess’ assurances resurfaced memories long buried. “The life ye had was hard-won and not by one man’s hands alone. If not for yer own sake, whose sake is it that ye live?”

Faces, gaunt and appraising, lingered in the darkness behind her eyes. They reached for her, implored her, asked her the same. For whose sake did she live? For what reason did she live? 

Rin had no answer for them or Kaede. With a soft call of goodnight, they separated and Rin tucked herself beneath the comforter with her pillow nestled tightly to her cheek. Tomorrow, her life would begin anew and she yearned for the dawn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First fanfic in the InuYasha fandom, what up?! I haven't been on this side of fandom town in awhile. Anyway, this fic is actually episodic. So there _are_ more updates, don't let that counter fool you. It's just that there's quite a bit to cover and a little _doing_ with figuring it out.
> 
> As usual, you can find me on tumblr, twitter, instagram, and tapas @unlockthelore. 
> 
> Thank you for reading!


	2. To Fool One's Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Rin prepares to depart on a journey, she seeks counsel and comfort in the sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Content Warning:** Graphic depiction of violence, allusions to abuse and neglect of a child.

**To Fool One's Eyes**

When Rin opened her eyes, the world was tinted in shades of blue and black. Shadows etched in the high wooden beams and dashing across the floors where the light filtered by the shoji couldn’t reach. A long corridor stretched before her, flecked with blue dawn light and shadow. Several soldiers stood at the walls, armed with spears tipped sharply and piercing eyes trained upon her. Sighing softly, Rin laid her hands against her lower stomach and turned on her heel. 

The tatami’s texture was lost on her but not the awe instilled by landscapes painted on the shoji paper, drapery adorning the walls in reds and whites, high above the stoic faces of the soldiers. A familiar crest upon the double-wide doors behind her — three white hexagons drenched in red with a four-petaled white flower in their centers. 

Rin sighed softly, recalling that crest fondly. Rippled on the long flowing sleeves and collar of a kimono, tucked beneath silver hair and spiked armor looped at the shoulder. There was none other like it and she knew it as if it were her own. 

Relief rushed through her at the success of her journey and she clapped her hands together, drawing a few smiles from the soldiers surrounding her. One stepped forward and she turned to greet him with a slight bow. It was difficult to discern his expression from beneath the drape of his helmet but Rin could have sworn she saw the corners of his lips twitch as he raised his hand quietly, shaking his head.

“Our Lady has been expecting you, Lady Rin,” he said, lowering his hand shortly after the words had been delivered. His voice, oddly boyish for someone so tall, was quiet and gentle though edged with amusement.

Jamming her fist in the crook of her hip, Rin tried to peer closer and catch a glimpse of his eyes beneath his helmet. He made no move to step away from her or look aside but his lips pressed together in a firm line, trembling and twitching upward at the corners as her stare lingered. 

“You are one of the brothers,” Rin muttered softly, tucking a knuckle beneath her chin thoughtfully. “And yet which one, I cannot tell.”

This earned a few scattered chuckles amidst the other sentries including a sputtered one from the soldier she assessed. 

“Let’s see… the _last_ time I visited like this, it was Ushio who greeted me first,” Rin tipped one finger toward the western wall where four soldiers exchanged small smiles. “And Umihiko was guarding the Eastern Wall, including a _vulnerable_ array of snacks in the kitchens that Lady Inukimi wasn’t keen on parting with until _after_ we spoke.”

The soldier Rin spoke to nodded. “He was given the utmost important job of keeping a thief from stealing the pastries meant for Our Lady’s guest.”

“Even if said guest was horribly deprived of their dessert?” Rin tossed an amused exasperated look at the snickering soldier standing by the wall leading down the corridor.

“I am afraid so, Lady Rin,” the soldier said, not sounding apologetic in the slightest, and the twitch of his lips proved unbearable as he smiled heartily. “When thief and guest are one and the same.”

Rin laughed heartily, the sound resonating off the wooden beams and the walls, returning to her as the soldiers one by one broke their stoic masks to chuckle and nudge one another. The one standing at Rin’s side reaching up to pull off his helmet though before it could slide free of his head, she closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. Listening for the slide of metal and the soft tap of his spear’s hilt against the tatami to open them.

“It’s good to see you,” she said, opening her eyes to the sight of a dark-haired young man smiling back at her. 

Long tresses of inky black tied up in a bun cinched tightly with a closely wound band of pearls, tiny and glittering in the blue dawn, twin green-scaled fin-like ears tipped with white pressing close to his head. His eyes, iridescent and alight with mischief, a sea foam blue reminding her of the sea at daybreak and matching the tint to his skin. Cracks between the rainbow-colored scales shifting, becoming darker then lighter with every breath. 

“Might I also remind, Lady Rin, you were in the company of Lord Sesshomaru during your last visit,” the soldier said, tucking his helmet beneath his arm and bowing his head to her, the second translucent lens closing over his eyes before his eyelids did. His smile showing a sliver of teeth, pointed and gnashing, eliciting a giggle from Rin. “It isn’t often that you visit us alone _or_ in the form of a spirit.”

Rin bounced on her toes and pressed her fingertips together behind her back, listening to the chuckles and mirthful exchanges amidst the soldiers. “Perhaps I should visit more often in this form,” she said, the watching soldiers hushing as she spoke, seeming to hang eagerly of her every word. “I may have better luck with raiding the kitchens.”

Grinning toothily, the soldier standing before her chortled. “I should tell the cooks their larders are safe for now.”

Cocking her hip and folding her arms, Rin’s brow raised. “Now who decided that?” she asked in a teasingly lilting tone, attempting to keep a smile from betraying her. 

Before their merrymaking could continue, a deafening howl of wind cut through the corridor and rushed til it brushed shy of Rin’s nose. A gentle breeze caressing her chin and curving around the back of her neck, fluffing her hair in the process before it receded. Drapery fluttering and flowers trembling in its wake, the soldiers exchanging glances before returning to their posts. The one standing before Rin straightening his posture, his toothy grin and luminous eyes tamed into an impassive gaze.

“Our Lady waits in her sanctum,” he said solemnly, sweeping a hand toward the corridor where the shoji paper still rippled and the wooden doors trembled. “Let us not keep you any further.” 

Rin shifted slightly, mindful of the change in their demeanors, and the apologetic gazes boring into her back as she padded across the tatami. Stepping out of the dimly lit foyer and into a swath of light, Rin held her hands close to her stomach then turned on her heel. Eyeing each of them and the dark imposing figures they cut with a warm smile.

“Thank you, it was nice to see all of you,” Rin said, the mood in the room shifting and a few smiles appearing beneath the helms. Regarding the soldier that she’d spoken to who returned to his post at the eastern wall, she allowed herself to smile. “Including _you_ , Ukito.”

Despite the summoning and the call to arms, Ukito stammered forward and endured the jeering of his peers. “How were you able to tell? We were _thrice_ as careful.”

Rin’s eyes drifted to the shoji and the twisting paintings beckoning her to walk on. A curl of warmth beneath her chin, turning her head toward the looming darkness further down the corridor. She felt something within her tighten, warm until it seared hot in her gut then release. Leaving only strangeness and cold in its wake.

“Your voice, when I tried to steal those pastries from before, it was you that called out to Lord Sesshomaru when he came looking for me.” Rin said, beginning the arduous yet short journey past the hall of sliding doors and to the castle’s inner sanctum. “I’m sorry that our first meeting is a little short, but I’ll come back to talk to you another day and _thank_ you for helping.”

As the breeze guided her further down the hall, the soldiers’ stares and murmuring grew distant, and Rin realized after looking over her shoulder — they were no longer there at all. 

Some unreadable emotion flickered through Rin’s eyes, and for a moment, she felt the darkness pooling around her beckoning her into its embrace. _Just a little further,_ she told herself as the number of shoji doors lessened bringing her to a hall entirely submerged in darkness. Her footsteps non-existent against the tatami and hands swinging her sides when they fell, the breeze beckoning her forward receding in a whispering hiss between two large doors. A rushing of wind heard from behind them bringing Rin a step closer.

Gathering her wits and her breath, she was unable to see her hands as she lifted them. Her skin warming and tingling as silvery wisps began to trace along the outline of her fingertips, traveling further until it covered her wrists. Palms, a ghostly pale white, outstretched toward the door where they laid against the aged wood smelling of jasmine and sandalwood. Inhaling the scent deeply, Rin exhaled heavily, the silver wisps traveling on her breath and pooling in a cloud of mist. 

Warmth seeped into her hands causing them to shake almost violently, forcing the mist cloud into the wood. Her arms trembling as an outline of the hexagonal sigil began to fill in with silvery light, etched into the doorway and gradually becoming full, until they shone bright enough that Rin shielded her eyes. A heavy thud followed a loud boom, the doors shuddering as they slid open.

“Enjoying your games with my soldiers, little bird?” A melodious, yet bored voice asked, stoking familiarity in Rin’s heart with cooling relief. 

Lowering her hand from her eyes, she peered into the inner sanctum and sighed softly. From the blue glow of the walls to the dawn light from the circular windows depicting a wondrous view of the lightning sky, she was mesmerized. Lanterns suspended in the air, drifted over her head as she walked inside, ignoring the heavy trembling of the doors as they slid shut behind her. Moons carved into the lanterns’ paper brightening and dimming in time with the luminous stone floating in the center of the room. The light seeming to circle around it as if drawn into its orbit, and the stone itself swirled with energy that both called out to Rin’s own and repelled it.

She breathed in heavily, hearing the whistling wind rushing through the room and wrapping around her, spinning her to one side. Amidst the shelves stacked high with all manners of tomes, scrolls, and trinkets, a demoness lounged across a long sofa with her legs crossed at the ankle and a sprawling scroll draped over her lap. The wind that’d spun Rin in circles receded and rustled the demoness’ silvery hair only slightly, slender fingers tipped with claws brushing the stray locks behind pointed ears. Her golden eyes, striking and reminiscent of another’s, drifted across the scroll as if none other mattered.

Recognizing the demand, Rin stifled a laugh with a swift bite to her lower lip. A fine silver brow arched as the demoness’s gaze flicked up to her. Cold struck Rin in the center of her chest and if not for her resilience to the demoness’s weighty gaze, she might have fallen to her knees beneath her glare. 

Mindful of the charged silence, Rin eased her lower lip from between her teeth and took a step closer to the demoness who lifted her chin in response to the closeness. “As enjoyable as they can be when I’ve lost the element of surprise.”

The demoness’s eyes drifted to her, lazily regarding her with a curious hum echoing throughout the room and reverberating into Rin’s own ears. “I know your presence as if it were my own, did you believe you could slip within my halls as easily as you would someone’s purse?”

“It would be a dull day if I did not try.” Rin said, stretching out her hands, brushing her fingers over one of the passing lanterns. 

Where others would have paused as the silver-haired demoness, equally intimidating as she was enchanting, rose — Rin smiled unabashedly and spun on her heel to admire the sheer number of weapons and tools adorning the walls and leant against the table where a great map was spread about with several points upon it. At the corner of her eye, a quick flash drew her attention to the violet gem of the necklace around the demoness’s neck. 

As if pleased by Rin’s recognition of the stone, the demoness smiled primly and rolled one end of the scroll. The other half carefully returning to join with it. Her hand winding the string to keep it closed with a quick pulse of youki to seal it, the familiar howling catching Rin off guard for a moment. Then, from the corner of her eye, the demoness regarded Rin coolly. 

“That it would,” the demoness replied, with neither derision nor affection, a heavy hardened edge to an otherwise blunt tone. Carefully, she rose from the lounge. The drape of her kimono, adorned with green and yellow butterflies, brushing against the tatami with every step. Fur pelt along a dark coat rippling as she tossed her hair over her shoulder with a backward flick of the wrist, approaching with slow sure steps. 

“It isn’t often you are without my son.”

Rin, unperturbed at the lessening distance between her and the approaching demoness, clasped her hands behind her back and swayed from one foot to the other. 

“As they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder…” She said, her gaze drifting to the paper lanterns painted with moons and stars, recalling the solitary figure drifting among them in the dusk sky over Kaede’s village. “Besides, it isn’t so much as me following _him_ nowadays as it is so much the other way around.”

If the demoness was perturbed by her lack of decorum, she didn’t say. Her silence retained until she stood before Rin, effortlessly towering over her in both presence and height, but lacking in arrogance in either. The demoness waited patiently as Rin took to observing the room’s effects. Golden eyes keenly observing and boring into every crevice of Rin’s being until she turned, meeting the demoness’ piercing gaze unflinchingly. As if amused, the silver-haired demoness nodded and tucked her hands within the sleeves of her robe.

“Yes, so often is he attached to your side.” The demoness said with unparalleled clarity, clipping Rin’s thoughts with a ghost of a smile on her lips. Her voice evened, the amusement gone in place of something far softer and worn. “Tell me, what is it you have come here for, little bird?”

Concern was easily dismissed by most but the demoness had ways of getting under Rin’s skin. From the closeness of her presence to the way that she stood by Rin’s side rather than before her, looming and quietly boasting strength. Lanterns drifting overhead cast shades of amber-blue light over them, outlining her sharp features and familiar golden eyes equally parts curious and worried. She offered no touch or word other than the question and the nickname’s sentiment, and Rin couldn’t help but smile.

While Kaede would deign to touch her familiarly, although with respect to her own privacy, the demoness offered no such aid. Having grown used to one another during her days of trailing after Sesshomaru, those were long past. A budding warmth building in Rin’s chest was cast aside as she turned her gaze from features, both familiar and nod, sighing softly. 

“Aside from conversation with you, Lady Inukimi?” Rin scuffed her heel against the tatami, her form tangible enough that her foot didn’t slip through the floor, but her movements made no sound. Instead, she focused on the humming of the radiant stone overhead and the fires roaring in the lanterns to gather her thoughts. “Advice, counsel, and peace of mind, if possible.”

The corners of her lips tugged downward as each word drifted into the air, both allowing her to breath easier and sinking her heart. From the window at the study’s northern wall, she could see the clouds drifting by in a sky still dark. Glittering stars fading one by one without their moon and taking with them her fear of dreams. Rin tried not to keep her eyes open for long but she also did not want to close them, instead allowing her body to rest while her spirit wandered.

“Respite from… life,” she finished, voice barely above a whisper, heavy with remorse.

For a moment, nothing was said but Rin felt Inukimi’s gaze linger atop her head, once again observing her but this time her eyes were trained somewhere below her nose. 

“What has been troubling you?” Inukimi asked. “You’re hardly ever _this_ serious, and it doesn’t suit you to frown.”

Surprised, Rin covered her mouth with a hand and Inukimi chuckled with a mirthful gleam to an otherwise uneasy gaze. “Perhaps you’ve picked up one of my son’s odd traits.” 

Huffing, Rin waved a hand dismissively as if batting the comment from the air between them. “Lord Sesshomaru doesn’t frown _all_ the time,” she said, recalling strongly a ghost of a smile on his lips quickly gone before it could be called upon. Fleeting ones throughout her memories, obscured by the length of his hair or his palm. 

Inukimi shook her head, the pearls on the necklace knocking together lightly and drawing Rin’s eyes to the gleaming stone embedded in its medallion. Swaying hypnotically until a hand clasped around it. “Not for you, perhaps,” Inukimi said, the words holding no trace of arrogance or malice, simply fact. 

Rin glanced aside, turning her head from the nearing lantern and the demoness’s knowing gaze. “Be that as it may, what _troubles_ me are my dreams. _Some_ a little less sweeter than others,” Rin’s eyes shuttered and for a moment, she was there in the dirt where the wolves laid her low. Unable to think further than the last moment, salivating wolves, darkness at her heels and the blurred faces of her family, her mother’s outstretched hand beckoning her to the other side. “Then there are others that are far too bitter. As of late, it’s been _easier_ or at the least the easiest it can be.”

Gaunt faces, hollowed eyes and gaping mouths, shouting and whispering their regrets in her ears. Unable to move on. Unable to find peace. All because _she_ survived. 

“Tell me of them,” Inukimi said, her voice cleaving through the chanting and drawing Rin back to the present graciously. Her eyes were cool and calm, voice impassive but despite the lack of a warm touch or a kind word, Rin felt relieved to have this space.

Drawing herself half into memory, the aged image of an injured daiyoukai hissing at her when she neared overlapped with his strengthening form. A stoic expression giving away very little, golden eyes lingering as he asked.

_Where did you get those bruises?_

Happiness blossomed in her chest then, warm and overwhelmingly bright to where she couldn’t help but smile. A glow of it resting in her breast and Rin laid her hand over it, feeling the gentle beat of her heart.

“You know how Lord Sesshomaru and I met…” Rin stepped forward and gathered one of the lanterns in her hands as it floated closer to her, the amber-blue light reflecting in her eyes, nearly blinding. “The village I lived in, its people weren’t kind to me.”

“Why is that?” 

Rin clenched her jaw, remembering the laughter and jeering of bandits ransacking the village. A few of the women hiding with their children while others were armed with sickles and rakes. They were naught but farmers, earning a simple living through toiling the land. Their hands were not made to handle swords but the ones who came for them cared little for a fair fight.

Her brother, young as he was, knobby-kneed and rosy-cheeked, braced her shoulders with hands firm enough that they felt like claws pricking her skin. He held her gaze, his face swimming in a blurred vision. Words muffled and drowned by the screaming of women, children crying, men shouting, and _laughter_. 

Her mother’s arms wound tightly around her as she yelled for her brother to come back inside. An axe that’d once been in the stump outside their home for cutting firewood held tightly in his hand, his jaw set and stern, seeming more like their mother than their father who stood with most of the men yelling for the intruders to leave. For a brief second as he stood in the doorway of their home, Rin wanted to ask him to obey their mother. So often had their mischief brought her grief and no small amount of lectures. But her brother was ever at her side.

“We’ll share the blame, alright, Rin?” 

He glanced at her, holding her gaze, and the world was quiet for a moment. The faintest twitch of a smile before he was gone from their mother’s outstretched hand. Disappearing into the chaos beyond the yard of their home and its safety. 

Her mother’s heartbeat, wildly racing, short puffs of breaths as she mourned her son with eyes shut tightly. Then with a ferocity, she yanked Rin away from the doorway and slammed it shut so hard that it rattled on its hinges. Her father’s back and her brother’s dark hair dancing on the breeze, fading images as her mother rushed through their home, pushing open the door sunken in on its hinges leading to the back of their home. Rin clung to her desperately, trying to drown out the screams with her face buried against her shoulder. 

It was so loud. The air was thick with blood, ash, and musk, threatening to suffocate her with every breath. Her mother’s hands clutching her hair so tight that her scalp throbbed, tears springing to her eyes. Swallowing a sob as her mother hushed her and ducked beneath the shadows of other huts, hiding from the rushing silhouettes, unable to discern whether they were friend or foe. 

“Father…”

It isn’t often that Rin saw her mother with tears in her eyes, calloused hands from working the fields running over her cheeks and brushing away her bangs from her eyes. Touch tender despite the roughness of her mother’s palms, embracing her cheeks, her cracked lips dusted with salty tears and dirt pressed to the middle of Rin’s forehead.

“You will see him again, father and Hitoshi…”

“Mother…” 

“Ssh, ssh.. It will be alright, Rin.” 

It never occurred to her before. How oft her mother’s smile warmed her heart until it was no longer there. But in that moment, ragged with grief and calming a weeping child amidst the destruction and plunder, her mother’s smile had never been more beautiful. 

“Hold to me tightly, Rin, don’t let go…” 

She clung to her mother desperately, mimicking the claw-like grasp her brother had upon her shoulders before he left them. Her mother, winding through the village’s roads, avoiding men with blades and catching the eyes of women shielding their own children or lying dead in the streets. The sounds Rin heard chilled her and her mother clamped a hand over her ear, whispering for her not to listen. To just hum softly in the same way they did when she combed her hair at night, and hold fast to her.

Darkness, ash, and blood were all that Rin knew aside from her mother’s gentle humming. She could pick out voices of the other villagers, howling and anguished screams. Among them, a smaller voice that she recalled calling out to her from the base of a tree, yelled in agony. Her head jerking upright and hands pushing at her mother’s shoulders. From between the gap of two houses, she saw the back of her brother’s kosode. His legs swinging uselessly in the air as he tried to force himself away from the man grasping him by the throat. The axe in hand was held by another, the men laughing and jeering as he struggled.

It wasn’t until Rin looked to her mother that she saw her staring. Having stopped where she was, eyes wide and misted over, either unseeing or disbelieving.

“Please no…” She gasped with a watery cry, hugging Rin painfully tight. 

Hitoshi reared his head back and with the determination brought on by desperation and hopelessness, he threw it forward, colliding his head with the bandit’s own. The axe-wielding one jumped away as his companion stumbled backward, Hitoshi falling into the mud and turning over to hand and knee. He looked up then, and Rin could see him —

Through the fields, showing her how to weave together the stems of daisies.

Beneath the comforter they shared as a family, telling stories of his dream of being a samurai.

Carrying her on his back, her knee skinned from falling out of a tree and his words comforting in her ear. 

_It’s okay, Rin. Brother is here, you can cry if it hurts._

And it hurt. It hurt as one of the bandits kicked him onto his back then stamped his foot against his stomach. The pain resonating in her own as if she’d been kicked herself, and her mother’s horrified cry muffled in her hair. In the firelight, the axe gleamed. 

Rin closing her eyes as it came down.

“Father!”

Her eyes shot open. Hitoshi scrambling to his feet in the slick mud, reaching for their father struggling for the axe. The two men wrestling in the dirt while the onlookers, entertained by the man’s desperation, jeered and hooted. Hitoshi grabbed by the back of his kosode and held with an arm around his throat. Their father, a man Rin had never seen without a kind word and a smile, roaring louder than thunder as he forced the bandit to his back. Driving his fist into his face until the axe was dropped and his movements stopped. A few of the bandits coming to grab him by his arms and hold him back.

“Hitoshi! Let him go, _let him go_!” 

“You killed one of ours,” the grinning-mouthed man holding Hitoshi shouted and it was as if the world deafened. “I believe we deserve compensation.”

A chorus of cheers sounded from around them and her father struggled harder as the axe was pried from the dead man’s hand, its blade held to her brother’s stomach.

“He’s just a boy,” her father sobbed brokenly. 

Hitoshi’s squirming having stopped and though Rin couldn’t see it, she felt the dread pooling in her stomach for him. 

“And if he grew to be a man, he’d be a killer, _just like his father_.” 

Their father screamed as Hitoshi was forced to the ground and the axe cleaved through the air. Her mother’s scream drawing the eyes of the others. Her breathing, short and gasping, did little to make up for the deafening sound. Rin’s ears still ringing and she could see a few of the men beginning to make their way between the huts toward them. Her mother hugging her tightly and her father’s shout echoing over them until the axe was forced into his own stomach, his eyes never leaving Rin’s own even when he was pushed to the mud. 

Her mother hissed a cry and darted off toward the forest, hugging Rin as tightly to her as possible despite the limpness in her hands and legs. Her father’s emptied gaze, her brother’s head lying crookedly from body. 

“Rin, _Rin_.”

Returning to focus, Rin stared up at the tree boughs overhead as her mother turned down a familiar road toward the river where they gathered water often and came to play or catch fish. A small cave, big enough to fit her, is where her mother set her. Pressing her hands to her cheeks, wiping away the tears that gathered at the corners of her eyes unbidden.

“Don’t make a sound until I call for you, understand?” When she didn’t speak, her mother clutched her shoulders tighter. “ _Rin_ , do you understand?” 

There was no cruelty in her words, only desperation. A mother trying to save her daughter from a cruel fate.

_Don’t go._

Her mother pressed another kiss, this one bruisingly harsh, to her forehead. Pushing her further into the opening before wandering backward, making quick work of her headscarf and tossing it to the river. Her dark hair flowing freely and wildly over her shoulders, hands braced at her sides and trembling as the bandits crept from the forest as quiet as wolves.

“You there,” one said, the same grinning-mouthed man. His hands stained and Hitoshi’s obi in hand, balled up after he used it to wipe his hands then threw it aside. “Why leave so soon?”

Two of the men flanking him laughed and her mother gritted her teeth, widening her stance.

“Ooh, do you mean to _fight_ us?” 

Her mother seethed. “You will pay for this. For _every_ drop of blood my husband and son shed, I hope your pain is tenfold.”

The men shared a look of surprise, their laughter amused as her mother shuddered and brazenly held her ground. 

_It’s why I fell in love with her. You see, your mother is the strongest woman I’ve ever known. I hope you grow to be like her one day, Rin._

One of the bandits stepped forward to seize her mother by the arm, and her fist swung, connecting to his cheek with a sickening crack. He stumbled backward, grasping at his face and the other two advanced toward her. One grasping at her arm while the other seized her leg as she thrashed wildly, kicking her opposite leg. Her foot connecting with the grizzled jaw of the grinning-mouthed man, sending him reeling. The bandit holding her arm seizing the other.

“Settle, you she-devil!”

“Go to _hell_!” 

She jerked her head back, catching him in the chin. The bandit she punched standing and rubbing at his jaw, unsheathing his blade as her mother broke free of the hold with a hard push to the one that’d been holding her sending him toppling to the river. Rin’s eyes widened and the sound rushed from her chest, a warning on her tongue as her mother turned around only to nearly be slashed by the blade. Her feet shifted unsurely at the river’s bank, sliding and catching on the rocks. 

“You’re going to regret that, woman.”

Her mother spat on the ground at his feet, the epitome of rage upon her face. 

“And when we find that girl you had —“

Her mother loosed a cry, sounding so much like her brother that for a second Rin thought she might have seen Hitoshi by their mother’s side. Her mother grasped the bandit’s wrist as he swung at her, the blade inches from her hip. The pair scuffling in the dirt as she pushed back against him, crying out as he pulled her hair, jerking her head to the side. Her elbow thrown back, connecting with his throat.

“Don’t talk about my daughter,” she hissed, gripping his ponytail and yanking his head down to meet her fist. The sword clattering to the ground between them and the back of her hand meeting his cheek. She was standing over him, holding him by the blood-stained chest plate he wore. “This is for my husband.”

Her fist connected once with a sickening crack, a gurgling yell from him as he clawed at her arms. Bloodied knuckles and tear-filled eyes as she raised it once more, struggling against him to hold him in place. Her knees on either side of him, hand around his throat as he clawed at her sleeves.

“And _this_ is for my son.”

Her fist came down again and this time, a choked sputtering sound arose. His clawing slowing and her mother’s fist raised again, the world seeming to slow as a blade cleaved through the air and struck her mother in the back. Her mother’s eyes widened, in that one sliver of breath between life and death, their eyes met but the words her mother might have wanted to convey were lost in the crimson coating her lips as she toppled over beside the wounded bandit she’d struck. The grinning-mouthed man was no longer grinning, rubbing his jaw and staggering toward her with sword in hand. 

“You fight like a demon,” he said, glaring down at her with a swift kick to her side. “But in the end, you’re only human.”

Her mother refusing to groan despite the pain contorting her face, squeezing her eyes shut as she settled on her back, glaring up at him. Blood ran down her lips, dripping off her chin in rivulets, staining the star-printed kosode Rin’s father had given her. It was her favorite, she tended to it every time it’d grown too threadbare. With the same hands, knuckles blistering an angry red, and fingers stained red. 

Tipping his head to one side, the bandit asked almost innocently. “What is your name?”

Her mother’s chest rose and fell deeply and she coughed, seething a breath and humming angrily as he stamped his foot against her stomach. Leaning down with the sword inches from her mother’s breast. 

“I want to remember it when I tell your daughter the one who made her life hell.”

“You will _never_ find h—“ 

The words died as the blade plunged into her chest, a terrible earth-shattering cry cut off as she laid there, eyes wide and hands left open. For a moment, the bandit lingered over her until he turned his gaze away to his injured companion struggling to his feet after regaining consciousness. 

“Search the woods,” he ordered, dragging his blade against the belly of her mother’s kosode then sheathing it. 

The bleeding man holding his nose with a disdained glare at her mother, kicking her side. “Ito..” He said, looking toward the river.

“Good as dead.” Their leader glanced back toward her mother’s corpse, hocking and spitting on her with a grimace. “Bested by one woman…”

Staggering up the river bank, he shoved his companion as the man tried to lean against him. The two disappearing into the trees.

Time was non-existent. Rin’s eyes never leaving her mother’s own, wide and unseeing, frozen with a look of impending doom. Her hand outstretched, fingers splayed as if reaching for her but Rin couldn’t bring herself to come any closer. The sun must have fallen by the time the voices came, a man trudging down the river bank with a lantern in hand. 

“Rin?” He called, cupping his hand around the side of his mouth. “Kasumi!”

Painstakingly trying to tear her gaze away from her mother, Rin neglected to answer. She couldn’t. Her mother hadn’t called for her. And she would. She _had_ to.

“R—“ The man came closer, as did the light, and Rin recognized who he was but that mattered little. His gaze softened and he lowered the lantern, reaching for her mother’s corpse though his hands did little but hover over her. As if unsure where or if he should touch. 

“Oh… Kasumi.”

Trembling, he pressed his fingers together and brought them to his forehead, bowing his head for a quick prayer. Opening his eyes and gathering the lantern, he slowly stood until he looked ahead right to where Rin was staring back at him. Making herself as small as possible as she shied from the coming light.

“Rin? It’s alright, girl. Did you hear me calling for you?”

He offered his hand but she made no move to take it even as he reached to pull her out. Her hands and legs limp, eyes never leaving her mother. Carefully, he slipped his arm around her and hiked her up on his hip, taking her further from her mother in body but her soul felt left in that small cave. 

She wasn’t sure how much time passed. A week. A month. The home that she’d known for so long was now empty, a place where she could reside with the other villagers looking after her. But they soon grew weary of her silences, the vacant way in which she sat before her families’ graves. Unweeping and without a word. Stealing from the larders, taking from the nets, enduring beating after beating only to haul herself to the hut upon the embankment to stare into the waters silently. 

“You have to speak if there is something you _want_ , Rin.”

Those words were so common and when she refused to speak, they gradually gave up on her one by one. All of them had lost someone during the bandit’s appearance. 

But life went on.

_Don’t make a sound until I call for you._

_Just hum the songs we sing together._

_It’s okay to cry if it hurts, Rin._

It went on for all others but her.

“… They couldn’t understand,” Rin managed to say, dots floating in the corners of her vision from staring too deeply into the lantern’s glow, allowing it to drift away. “Some nights, I dream of them and their questions of why it is that _I_ survived when _they_ died.”

Unworthy. Unappreciative. Undeserving. 

Her parents fought hard to ensure the others survived, and her brother lost his life with his last words being a blur in her memory. Wrong as it felt to consider the remnant’s words, Rin couldn’t help but lend to their curiosity. Why had she survived when all others died?

“If you ask yourself that question, little bird, you will never find peace.” Inukimi’s voice split the melancholy drifting through her, and beckoned Rin’s attention with no hope for disobedience. Once their eyes met, Inukimi’s calm and cool gaze matched that of her words. Crisp and clipped. “ _You_ lived because you survived.”

A disbelieving bark of laughter, no more than a puff of air, was punched through Rin’s chest at those words. “Survived?” Rin echoed, self-loathing bettering her words as she raised her hands. Her translucent body reflecting the amber-blue light as if she were a ghost herself. 

Perhaps she’d already been. In some ways, she was much like that young girl whose life bled from her drop by drop as her family met their end. In others, she was something much different.

“I died _twice_. Lord Sesshomaru brought me back with Tenseiga, then you with the Meidō Stone. Surely knowing that someday _neither_ of you will be able to aid me in cheating death,” Rin shuddered, clenching her jaw as she recalled her mother’s vacant eyes. Her brother’s resilience. Her father’s desperation. Jaken’s tears. Kohaku calling her name. Sesshomaru’s hand cupping her cheek. “And will bury me or scatter my ashes on the wind.”

Drawing a breath when Inukimi said nothing, Rin cursed and bit her lower lip harshly. Pacing to one wall where a shelf stacked to the ceiling with scrolls greeted her. Her hand opened and closed at her side as she glanced to the side, marveling at the wide curvature of the blade mounted to to the wall. It’s balance would have thrown her off and the curvature of it reminded her almost of Tessaiga. Her hand itching at her side, coming to rest over her lower stomach.

“Tenseiga is the Heavenly Rebirth Fang, a sword that can resurrect one hundred souls in a single stroke,” Rin recited, curling her fingers tightly in her sleep yukata. “Yet twice, _twice_ , Lord Sesshomaru attempted to use it just for _one_ little girl. Even I want to know why.”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Inukimi’s voice was so close that Rin could have almost mistaken she’d spoken in her head. Though once she turned, she saw the demoness standing where she had before. But where there had been a coolness to her gaze now softened with an unreadable emotion. “He _cares_ for you, little bird.”

The lanterns drifting overhead dimmed their lights, floating out of her path as she walked toward Rin with slow certain steps. “His father was similar in his ways of showing affection, and though Sesshomaru inherited less of his charm and more of mine, his actions speak louder than any word he could say.”

As she stood before Rin once more, she lifted her hand and a powdery violet aura outlined her fingertips. 

“If your life wasn’t valuable to him in some form, I assure you,” She reached out, slipping her fingers into Rin’s hair and palming her cheek.The silvery wisps of Rin’s own energy beginning to tint violet and the touch warm to her skin. “Sesshomaru would not have gained the power to use Tenseiga as a weapon. Or spared your life. But I think you know this…”

_Sesshomaru would not have returned ye to life, nor would Tenseiga have responded if not for your effect on his heart._

_You will never find her._

Rin shuddered, her heart beating harsh enough that it might have escaped her chest if possible.

“It takes a compassionate heart, one that knows both fear and sorrow of loss, to value life,” Inukimi explained, her thumb brushing beneath Rin’s eye and tipping her head up. Golden eyes burning brighter than the sun, the unreadable emotion only growing stronger but Rin still could not place its name. “And you taught him the meaning of life… regrettably, through your death.”

Rin scowled. To die more than once was a feat in itself. But the reminders were ones she carried every day. Miracle though it was that her life was restored, fear and terror weren’t so easily dissuaded. 

“First, at the hands of the Northern Lord’s wolves,” Inukimi said. “Secondly, through Sesshomaru’s own desire to seek power. He abandoned Tenseiga in the Underworld, choosing instead to cling to your corpse. But in the time between, the days you lived separately and with him, you were meant to fend for yourself.”

Rin’s eyes widened. Her gaze inquisitive and reproachful but Inukimi merely raised a brow in response, continuing on as if she hadn’t implicated anything.

“Scavenging, stealing, evading, you are _far_ more clever than you believe.” Inukimi drew her hand back to her side, taking with it the warmth that budded in Rin’s chest, leaving only a faint reminder. “And it’s through your clever and earnest ways, the change and growth you experienced, that you endeared yourself to those around you.”

Rin’s eyes softened and she weighed the words carefully on her tongue before speaking them. “And to you?”

In the briefest glimmer of vulnerability, Rin could have sworn that she’d seen affection in Inukimi’s eyes. The trace of it gone before she could probe any further and the demoness turning her head away, beckoning one of the lanterns closer with an upraised palm. “Now that your doubts have been eased, tell me. What of the other dream?”

“How did you know…”

With as casual as the words were spoken, Rin had little time to put up her guard before her secret fled from her lips. Inukimi’s lips quirked at the corners, a mischievous look in her eye as she glanced her way. The lantern resting on her palm held between them. 

“I didn’t, you just told me.”

Realizing she’d been had, Rin sucked her teeth and looked away from the lantern, inching from between the bookshelf and Inukimi to keep herself from being cornered. The violet tinge to her energy lessened the greater the distance between them became until Rin found herself standing beneath the luminous stone, gazing up the tiny particles of light drifting around it. 

“… It may be nothing. Symbolic, perhaps.”

“Symbols mean something, little bird. You’re stalling.”

Rin’s eyes drifted down and for a moment, she said nothing. Inukimi wouldn’t drag answers out of her by force but her stubbornness was outmatched. Loathe as Rin was to admit it, she _had_ come to her for advice and counsel. Keeping appearances would only take away from that. If only that made it easier for her to speak.

“… In my dreams, I see a crow.” 

Gazing up at the stone’s glow, her mind wandered to a dark looming figure perched on the barren bough of an aged tree. The crow’s beak glistening despite the lightless sky and its wings tucked closely to its hulking frame, baring down upon her with voids for eyes. A chill pricked the hairs at the back of her neck and she swallowed thickly, fear and uncertainty bitter on her tongue.

“Not a normal crow, and not the Shibugarasu, I asked Kagome and she killed it years ago…”

From Kagome’s account, the Shibugarasu was a crimson beady three-eyed beast with a barbed tail that swallowed the Shikon no Tama, inadvertently starting her adventures with Inuyasha when she struck it thus shattering the jewel. Worry lingered in her eyes as she recounted the story. One hand clasping over Rin’s own when the silence stretched for longer than her comfort.

_You aren’t having dreams about it, are you? Inuyasha —_

_No. It’s not that, and don’t tell aniki, he’ll just worry needlessly._

_It’s not needlessly, Rin. We care —_

Rin breathed in deeply, cutting off the ghost of Kagome’s words and the warmth of her hand. Instead, gazing into her memory of those voided eyes. 

“This was… something _else_. It appears in my dreams often, and when I look toward it, I feel like I’m sinking away from my body and being pulled…” 

With rapt attention, the bleakness of the crow’s eyes drew her further even in memory. Beckoning her to take a step forward. To cross some imaginary line. The dread that filled Rin’s stomach stirred anew as she took a step forward in the sodden earth, hearing the wind rustle, and the bleak feathers trembled. A void opened as the crow’s beak parted. Cold stealing her breath and freezing her heart mid-beat. 

“Into an endless abyss.”

Snapping back to focus, Rin staggered forward, throwing out her hands to keep herself from colliding into the table before her. It’s a painfully long moment that passes before she turns. Inukimi staring at her, neither moving from where she stood or seemingly unruffled.The lantern in her hand casting an unearthly glow over the marks on her cheek, her eyes seeming to shine brighter than the stone above Rin’s head.

Inukimi’s posture eased, her wandering eyes raking over Rin shamelessly as if she were a mystery to be solved. Never one to falter beneath scrutiny, Rin straightened her spine and braced her hand against the table’s edge, the frayed edges of the map beneath her fingertips. 

“Curious,” Inukimi said, utterly expressionless. “Tell me, when the crow leaves you, to where does it fly?”

Rin furrowed her brows, unsure of the meaning behind the question. She was quiet for a second, glancing down at the map then to the demoness. “The sky.”

“And from where does it descend?” Inukimi continued, allowing the lantern to float aside. She didn’t wait for an answer, walking toward the sliding door and laying her hand on the wood. The insignia pulsing and filling out with a violet light, sliding open quickly for its mistress. 

“… The same,” Rin answered, her voice quieter as the demoness stepped strode into the dimly lit hall with only one of the lanterns to follow her. “Lady Inukimi?”

When she was given no response, Rin followed in earnest, slipping past the door before it slid shut and rattled on the hinges. The glowing violet insignia dimming. Gazing down the hall, only Inukimi and the lantern could be seen. Even the hall itself seemed different and Rin crept warily until she was close to the demoness’ back enough to follow behind her longer strides.

“You know what it means?” Rin asked, 

“An _idea_ ,” Inukimi clarified, an absentmindedness to her words as if she were speaking to Rin and not. Not once did she deign a look toward her, instead gazing ahead with a murmur in her voice. “A child who has died twice over, lingering in the world of the living with tethers to the dead, dreams of a crow.”

Coming to terms with the demonness speaking _of_ her but not to her, Rin decided her attention was better off elsewhere. Holding her hands out with a silvery wisp of energy to call the lantern to her palms, she peered around at the walls. Wooden, not a bit of shoji in sight, or drapery. This hall _was_ different. She couldn’t even feel the presence of the soldiers guarding the inner sanctum. 

“The hall changed,” Rin mused aloud, scrutinizing the walls and the flooring, brushing her fingers against the wood and stopping to examine the grain. “Where _are_ we, Lady Inukimi?”

As if realizing she was joined by someone for the first time, Inukimi looked back at her. Her golden eyes glowing in the darkness and Rin quickly held up the lantern to shed light on the rest of her. Far too unsettled by eyes following her in the dark, for comfort. A flicker of concern showed in Inukimi’s eyes and she reached out, curling a finger to beckon Rin closer.

Hesitantly, she approached and stood by the demoness’ side, allowing her to ease the lantern from her grasp. The brush of their fingers electric against Rin’s palm. Her hand snatched back and gaze averted when Inukimi eyed her quizzically. 

“There is nothing to fear here, little bird.”

Rin rolled her eyes and gestured to the semi-somnolent darkness around them. “Aside from not knowing where I am?”

Inukimi chuckled dryly. “You may be lost but you are _safe_ , calm yourself and the path will light its way.” 

After a few seconds of pushing away choice words for the demoness, Rin took a few steadying breaths and waited by her side with the lantern floating between them. Particles of amber-blue drifting from its opening and floating in separate directions, seeming to catch on torch along the walls, lighting up a corridor leading in four different directions. Rin glanced behind her then forward, taking a few hesitant steps forward to peer down the western and eastern corridor. Leveling her hand with her eyes and attempting to peer into the darkness of the path before them. Nothing could be discerned, the only lights being the torches at the cornerstone of each path. 

From behind, Inukimi stood and Rin could feel the amusement rolling off her in waves. “You know, I always found it funny how you call me ‘little bird’.”

“Why is that?” Inukimi asked with an innocent airs that set Rin’s hair on edge, her footsteps soft while she strolled forward and stood by Rin’s side.

Rin breathed in deeply , wishing that instead of the high wooden beams and identical corridors, lush green plains and bountiful forests were in her view. Alas when she blinked, all she could see were the corridors and Inukimi awaiting a response. 

Eyeing her dubiously, Rin sighed when the demoness did nothing in reply.“I used to be afraid of the sky, it was so big and I was so _little_ … It was funny, just a little. A bird afraid to fly, just wandering about on the ground…” 

Just as the water in the river by her hut was so deep and she could only go so far without being swept off. Bitterly, more than once, she told herself none would care if she had been. Swallowing the thought, she kept her gaze focused on the demoness instead.

Inukimi’s eyes weren’t unkind but they were hardened with a care that Rin had seen twice before, in Kaede’s eyes and her own mother’s. “Do you know why I called you that?” Inukimi asked, and the question was so softly spoken that Rin almost forgot that an answer was prompted til the demoness lifted a brow. 

Canting her head to one side, Rin muttered. “.. Well, no.”

Inukimi’s lips twitched at the corners and in the glow of the lantern, a small smile showed itself. Genuine, faint, and so warm that Rin felt the chill pricking hairs on the back of her neck dissipate. 

“You reminded me of a baby bird when we first met. In need of someone to care for you, provide you shelter…” A glimmer of amusement showed, the marks on her cheeks shifting as a tenderness touched her voice. “As you grew, I watched your wings grow and you take flight. But to me, you’ll always be that chirping little bird. The same way that my son will always be my baby…”

Slowly, tentatively, Rin nodded. A wave of calm swept through her and the fear that’d been built alongside doubt and shame was washed into the reaches of her mind. 

“I like you too.”

Whether it was her vision swimming or the impossible brightness of the lantern’s glow, Inukimi’s image grew hazier around the edges as the feeling in Rin’s chest grew stronger. More fragments of light dissipated into the air and Rin found it easier to breathe as the shadows caved.

Covering her eyes when the light became too bright, it was until Rin heard a soft call of, “Here we are,” that she uncovered them.

The four cornerstones around her came into view blearily but they were no longer connected to corridors but instead shelves. Shelves stacked high with scrolls piled atop one another, leaning against tomes of different sizes, and neatly arranged. The path ahead of her, the one to the west and the east, were all bookshelves. A strange look must have shown on her face because Inukimi covered her mouth with her sleeve to hide her mirth and stifle a laugh.

“Really, child, have you never been inside of a library before?” She asked, then seeming to remind herself, shook her head. “No, I suppose you haven’t.”

“It’s…”

Indescribable. The shelves themselves were far taller than Rin and when she peered down the path that they’d come, she could still see the outline of the door leading to the inner sanctum. Perhaps the path had changed but the destination was connected. From overhead, the wooden beams joined toward what Rin thought was a hole in the roof. A view of the now pale blue sky, thick with clouds drifting past, providing light accompanied by the lantern lighting torches along the sides of the shelves. 

“The stories may have depicted my husband as a warmonger,” Inukimi said, her lips thinning into a grimace despite the warmth in her voice. “But he was a man who loved to tell and read stories. He believed legends were real, and that in all stories, there is some grain of truth.”

Rin was careful not to wander off in the seemingly endless maze. There wasn’t only four shelves but _numerous_ and she wasn’t sure for how long the room stretched or how deep it went, from the winding staircase she saw in between two of the shelves they passed. 

“Has Lord Sesshomaru been here before?”

“When he was a boy. He often followed at his father’s footsteps, and to bring him rest, Touga would read to him throughout the night.”

It was a little hard for Rin to think of Sesshomaru as ever being a child but his mother was proof that he’d once been small. And she had no small amount of stories to embarrass the daiyōkai. 

“So, what does being here have to do with my dreams?” Rin asked, soft and skeptical.

With one slender finger raised, Inukimi silenced her from any further questions then gestured between two bookcases. Coming around the bend then holding up a hand to stop Rin in her tracks. After peering at the scrolls, scanning them with a claw tapping along their knobs, Inukimi seemed to find the one she was looking for and pulled it free. A small cloud of dust arising and calmly swept aside to where it nearly puffed in Rin’s face, a light breeze causing it to drift away. 

Rin glanced up at Inukimi and the demoness held her gaze for a moment, the corner of her lips quirking with amusement and Rin rolling her eyes in response. 

“You sneeze like a kitten,” Inukimi said, holding out the scroll to her.

“What’s this?” Rin asked, pointedly ignoring those words and turning the scroll over in her hands, her thumb fiddling with the tie. 

“It should help with your dreams.” Inukimi said, though her voice held a certain ambivalence that roused Rin’s curiosity. “Or perhaps provide insight into what _may_ be plaguing you.”

“… What is it about?”

Inukimi smiled thinly, though she covered it with her sleeve and a thoughtful tap to her cheek, her eyes crinkling at the corners in her amusement. “You will just have to find out, now won’t you?”

Rin made a face and sighed wearily. “I didn’t exactly bring a robe with me, or an actual _body_.”

“Surely the priestess who’s been teaching you has shown you a few of her tricks,” Inukimi said, plain amusement showing in her eyes. 

Rin sighed, exasperatedly fond. It was an uphill battle with Inukimi remembering _anyone_ ’s names it seemed and she was certain the demoness was doing it on purpose. Though at least she didn’t call Kaede anything offensive as she often took to doing with Jaken. 

“Follow me, you’ll need to concentrate for this and we’ve spent too much time inside as it is.”

Little complaint was given as Rin followed. Wanting to see the sky more than anything after too many brushes with the abyss. Tucking the scroll closer to her, she brushed her fingers against her sleeve and pushed it upward, distantly wondering how her skin could feel so cold when she wasn’t _there_. Inukimi provided no insight, walking ahead until the library and its light distanced, the torches snuffing out one by one until Rin could no longer discern the shadows of the shelves or the light above them. 

As they walked, Rin noticed the walls seeming to change around Inukimi as her energy drifted from her with every step. The shoji and its paintings returning as well as the room of soldiers, jarring Rin immediately as she whipped her head around.

“How did you…”

Inukimi gave her a knowing smile and shook her head, walking along. “You’ll understand one day what it means to step into a yōkai’s domain. I believe that’s one of your slayer mentor’s lessons, isn’t it?”

Rin winced. She wasn’t sure that mentioning learning about the clan of demon slayers around other _demons_ was wise but none of the soldiers they passed seemed bothered. In fact, some even seemed amused or interested with little smiles quickly dissipating as Inukimi stepped in their vicinity. The doors opened, this time without the sigil’s glow and a rush of wind swept Rin’s hair back. Her mouth opening wide and lips pulled back into a cheery smile, the scroll clutched tight in hand as she bounded down the steps and across the tiled floors toward the large staircase. The expanse of the sky opened up before her and she marveled at it. 

“You’ve seen this sight every time you come here,” Inukimi said, seemingly affected by Rin’s cheer with a quiet thoughtfulness to her tone. 

“And it never gets old,” Rin replied, never looking away from the sea of clouds. 

They stand there in silence for some time. Both lost to their own thoughts and allowing the world to drift past. Rin’s attention, drifting to the scroll, helps her draw her energy to one point. The silver aura inching across the scroll’s knob, outlining the length of it until it shone, becoming translucent. 

“So you _have_ been learning.”

Sheepishly, Rin ducked her head with a little grin. “A bit. Everyone has their own way of helping me. Lady Kaede teaches me how to control my energy, Aniki — er — _Inuyasha_ , has been teaching me how to fight with a sword. And Aniue — g _ah_ — _Miroku_ , does meditations with me in the morning.”

Inukimi didn’t mention the endearments although from the look in her eye, she surely hadn’t missed Rin’s stumbling over them. After so long spent in the village, the others had become a family to her although she was a little hesitant to admit it out loud. 

“And the slayer has taught you her ways, while the girl found in time taught you hers.” Inukimi stated, thoughtfully. The joy in Rin’s chest cooling with pinpricks of anticipation long wrought from a sense of danger. A threat looming, not physical but emotional, reaching her ears before she could steel herself. “But the rest, the faces of those you loved and lost, that is your own guilt.”

Rin met Inukimi’s gaze calmly, and the demoness’ eyes were gentle though her words were piercing in every way.

“You fear love.”

Swallowing the sticky ichor building in her throat, Rin grimaced. 

“Affection.”

Kaede’s touch ghosted on her shoulder, the hesitance in her hands, which could have just as easily pulled Rin close as they could push her away. They both knew why she wouldn’t take the next step. They hadn’t talked about it and likely wouldn’t for some time. Half-spoken sentiments and soft words filled her mind and lingered, washed away as she breathed in deeply.

“And you fear life but you _love_ it. You want to live but you feel _guilty_ for it,” Inukimi stated, her voice knowing and Rin almost wondered if the demoness could see into the core of her being. Or if she had been that obvious in the years between. For a moment, neither of them said a word. Rin clutching the scroll tightly until she felt the paper begin to crinkle beneath her knuckles. And Inukimi glancing down at her hand, watching it tremble impassively, then looking away toward the lightening sky. 

“You will have to come to peace with it. _If_ you wanted to die, then you would have. It’s as simple as that.”

Pressure settled deep in Rin’s chest. 

_You lived because you survived._

_You are lost but you are safe._

“A bird cannot remain in one place for long,” Inukimi said, a softness to her voice almost akin to that of a mother cooing to her child. Rin heard that sound _many_ times after delivering a child, and each time it soothed her just a bit more. Whether unaware of the effects of her words or not, Inukimi continued on. “While the flow of time cannot be stopped, the time that you have can be controlled.”

Rin’s brows furrowed and her hand cupped at her chest. Though she couldn’t feel the beating of her heart, she knew that she still drew breath in the world below. 

“There is no guarantee Sesshomaru will outlive you.”

Rin’s gaze snapped up to meet Inukimi’s own. The demoness staring at her resolutely, a heaviness to the slight downward twitch of her lips as they thinned tightly. 

“He may die tomorrow just as easily as he could watch you die once more. Even your friends, human and yōkai, may meet the same end. Unless you make a decision, time will come for you to fly and you will fall to the forest floor when you were meant to soar.”

Rin swallowed the bile. A number of protests on her tongue though all of them were moot. She knew Inukimi was right. Deep down, she knew her time had been limited from the moment she was revived for the second time. Life was a precious thing but it was so fleeting. And she lived her life in accordance to her own laws and desires, including basking in the presence of those she loved.

Inukimi’s hand settled on her shoulder and a wave of calm swept through her, cracking and draining the ichor from her being. Releasing the breath built up in the swell of her chest, Rin blinked away the budding tears and looked up at the demoness with a stern jaw. 

Nonplussed, and even somewhat pleased, Inukimi returned her gaze. Shifting her hand to cup the underside of her jaw, her claws grazing along Rin’s cheek tenderly. 

“Nevertheless, Rin. No matter the fate you choose, I only ask you to protect yourself,” she said. “And if you should find yourself in need of advice once more, you know how to find me.”

With that, she drew her hand away and took with it her warmth and the faint outline of violet. “And if I want to talk?” Rin asked quietly, steeling herself for the rejection that might come. 

Inukimi’s face took on a thoughtful look and the smile she wore was the faint and gentle one, rare as it was, Rin committed it to memory with the others. “I suppose I don’t mind your company…”

Perhaps a bit too gleeful, Rin smiled, ignoring the heaviness in her heart to step toward the demoness. “May I push my luck just a bit further?”

Raising a brow with a wary look, Inukimi tucked her hands into her sleeves, the gleam of the Meidō Stone drawing Rin’s eye. “I suppose it depends on what you wish to push your luck with.”

Rin squared her shoulders as if she were preparing to fight, the scroll held out in the palm of her hand as she opened her arms. “A hug?” She asked with the same hopefulness that often won her many sighs and less lectures.

Inukimi regarded her silently, raking her gaze up and down before glancing aside a way that _almost_ reminded Rin of Sesshomaru.

“… One.”

Rin would have squealed if she hadn’t thought it would have robbed her of this moment. Despite the demoness’ terse words, there was a relief. A breath of fresh air and _perhaps_ a chance. Inukimi was many things, but she was never without purpose, much like her son. As Rin slid to the demoness’ side and tucked her arms around her in a tight embrace, the scroll was clutched tightly in her palm. A giddy laugh bubbling from her throat betraying the weight of her heart.

From above, she heard a small fond sigh and felt the arm wind around her shoulders to return the embrace. 

After some time, Rin shuffled a bit to look up at her, smiling almost impishly. “So, out of curiosity, when _will_ you tell me your true name, Lady Inukimi?”

“Do you not prefer that charming little alias you’ve given me?”

“Master Jaken was horrified when I spoke it for the first time.”

“Ah that he was, perhaps that’s why I’m fond of it.”

They shared a laugh and stayed together, watching as the sun began its ascent. With one last squeeze, Rin pulled away slowly and nodded to Inukimi with a tired yet appreciative smile. 

“I should be returning now, if Lady Kaede finds I haven’t woken and my spirit energy missing, she’ll worry.”

Inukimi nodded in turn, gently patting down her hair, tracing the curve of her cheek to her chin with a little smile playing at her lips. “Safe travels, little bird.”

Rin nodded, taking a deep breath. “Until next time,” she promised, her body beginning to glow and unravel in threads of light. Inukimi and the view of her castle, the wide expanse of the sky, and all else fading away. 

When Rin opened her eyes, the wooden beams of Kaede’s hut caught her eye along with a hole in the thatched roof. She made a dull note in mind to fix that, taking a few testing breaths to ensure her soul had returned to her body. Glancing aside at the silhouette of Kaede still tucked beneath her comforter, Rin smiled and shuffled her arm from beneath the blanket. 

The scroll resting in the palm of her hand just as it’d been when she was in Inukimi’s domain. Sighing softly, Rin pushed herself upright. 

She could keep this to herself for now. Although, she knew that it wouldn’t stay that way for long. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **This chapter** took _so_ long to finish because there was a _lot_ to go into it! Now, they may not _all_ be this long but there was a considerable amount of emotion, character interaction and scenery that went into constructing this. Anyway, it's **done** and I am so happy!
> 
> For anyone who is curious, the act Rin pulled off to enter Inukimi's domain is called **spirit-walking**. Essentially, her body is just lying there while she is wandering off without it. Which could be dangerous, no doubt, but that's something to consider for later. 
> 
> There's a lot of things at work here and I enjoyed this little bit of a push forward for Rin. A kick in the ass is definitely what she needed and she sought out someone who would help her or understand her.
> 
> I may _try_ to update once a week but we'll see how that goes.
> 
> Anyway, thank you for reading!


End file.
